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Uzbekistan’s 2018 cotton harvest, which concluded in all regions of the country the first week of December, showcased the enormous challenges in uprooting the country’s deeply entrenched forced labor system. Driven by a commitment to reform at the highest levels of the government, there is a significant transition underway, which is reflected in some encouraging signs of progress.

Following an open letter to Fair Trade USA signed by 25 human rights, labor rights, and faith-based organizations, Fair Trade USA has suspended Suragroh, a melon company in Honduras owned by Fyffes, one of the largest global fruit brands and the top importer of winter-season melons to the U.S. market.

On December 29, Thailand voted to ratify the International Labour Organization Convention on Work in Fishing (No. 188), a point that the International Labor Rights Form has campaigned for following the ILO’s adoption of the Convention in 2007. Thailand is the first Asian country to ratify the Convention. This Convention sets the bar that working conditions on Thai fishing vessels must meet and is an important step towards eliminating labor abuses in the supply chains of international brands sourcing seafood from Thailand.

A coalition of unions, farmworkers, fair trade advocates, ethical businesses and retailers is confronting Fair Trade USA (FTUSA), a US-based fair trade certification agency, for ignoring human rights abuses and its own standards in certifying a Honduran melon grower with a long history of violations.

Protesters gathered outside the United Nations headquarters in New York today demanded an end to state-sponsored forced labor in Turkmenistan’s cotton industry and presented a petition signed by over 84,000 people from around the world that urged the Turkmen government immediately release Gaspar Matalaev and allow him to continue his work safety. The demonstration was during Turkmen President Gurbanguly Berdimuhamedov’s first visit to the United States in three years.

Research findings published today reveal that many workers making H&M’s clothes live below the poverty line -- despite H&M’s promise of a living wage by 2018, and despite the brand’s recent deceptive claims of progress. Interviewed workers in India and Turkey earn about a third and in Cambodia less than one-half of the estimated living wage. In Bulgaria interviewed workers’ salary at H&M’s “gold supplier” is not even 10 per cent of what would be required for workers and their families to have decent lives.

In a climate of fear and intimidation and after months of delays, Bangladeshi authorities have announced the new monthly minimum wage of 8,000 taka (USD 95) for the 4.5 million workers in the garment sector in Bangladesh. This amount shows complete disregard for legitimate workers' unions and for the need to set wages through social dialogue.

Public sector workers not mobilized en masse to work in Uzbek cotton fields in Spring 2018

09/10/18

For the first time in years, public sector workers were not forcibly mobilized to plant and weed cotton in Uzbekistan in spring 2018, although serious structural problems in the cotton sector threaten to undermine this development. The Uzbek-German Forum, a Cotton Campaign member, released these findings in a report published today.

The Minimum Wage Board in Bangladesh will reconvene on Wednesday, 29 August, to set the new statutory minimum wage for workers in Bangladesh's garment industry. Ahead of this meeting Clean Clothes Campaign, the International Labor Rights Forum and Maquila Solidarity Network jointly urged major brands sourcing from Bangladesh to publicly support workers’ demands. These include the minimum wage of 16,000 taka, a statutory framework to govern pay grades and promotion and other welfare measures.

Ahead of the long overdue meeting of the national Minimum Wage Board, set to take place on Sunday, 8 July, Clean Clothes Campaign expresses solidarity with workers in Bangladesh and full support for their demands. We urge the Minimum Wage Board to increase the minimum wage to 16,000 taka without delay, and to adopt other measures requested by workers and their representatives.

The U.S. State Department upgraded Thailand to Tier 2, the middle of three possible rankings, in its annual Trafficking in Persons (TIP) Report yesterday. It was one of several country rankings that have raised alarm among international anti-trafficking advocates, including U.S.

On May 31, the Thai Appeals Court ruled in favor of Andy Hall, a British labor activist who faced imprisonment for his legitimate work reporting on the abusive treatment of Myanmar migrant workers at a pineapple factory owned by the Thai corporation, Natural Fruit Company Ltd.

Reports of forced labor and other egregious abuse of workers onboard fishing vessels are likely to continue unless governments and industry actors take a different approach to remedying them, according to a report released today by the International Labor Rights Forum (ILRF).

CCC and ILRF dedicate this year’s International Workers' Day to the 850,000 workers who produce garments for H&M, urging the brand to meet its living wage commitment

05/01/18

Starting on 1 May and continuing throughout 2018, the Clean Clothes Campaign (CCC) and International Labor Rights Forum (ILRF) are placing the spotlight on H&M. We are asking the brand to turn around and stop heading in the direction of letting down 850,000 workers who are waiting to start receiving living wages – as H&M vowed they would by this year.

Today, shoppers and employees at twenty Abercrombie & Fitch stores encountered questions about whether the company will dial back on workplace safety in the garment factories in Bangladesh producing its clothes as students and consumers protesting at the stores chanted “Garment workers demand their rights / We will show and we will fight!” and held signs reading “Worker Lives Are at Stake” and “No One Should Die for Fashion”.

A few days before the fifth anniversary of the Rana Plaza disaster that killed 1,134 workers, global trade unions and labour rights organizations are calling on all brands sourcing from Bangladesh to take responsibility for workers making their products by signing the renewed Bangladesh Accord on Fire and Building Safety.